I first heard the word “oxymoron” decades ago, when it was used, in typically erudite fashion, by William F. Buckley Jr. in a televised debate. In essence, an oxymoron is a contradiction – the dictionary definition of “a cruel kindness” is a good example. So when Ferrari came out with a hybrid car at the Geneva Auto show today (March 5, 2013), all I could think of was – WOW, this is the king of all oxymorons. A hybrid that goes a zillion miles an hour and might get 17 mpg instead of 12.

The major point of a hybrid is to save money on gasoline because the combined electric-and-gasoline-powered car is going to get better fuel mileage than a normal car. But in a 963-horsepower Ferrari that will probably have a base price of $1.3 million, according to Automotive News, aren’t we begging the question a bit? Does it really matter that you will be paying less for gas than you did when you were driving, say, your Aston Martin DBS or your Bugatti Veyron? No matter. Why is Ferrari building LaFerrari? Ferrari is building LaFerrari (aka the F70) because they can. Hybrid cars also appeal to the politically correct, so if you can pay the freight for an F70 that will give you environmental bragging rights at the Casino de Monte Carlo when you’re between turns at the roulette wheel, then, well, order one up.

Landscape is changing

They must be chortling at the home offices of Honda and Toyota, longtime producers of the humdrum hybrid cars with which we’re all familiar – Toyota Prius, Honda Insight. Honda and Toyota have been at it for more than 15 years and there are more than a million Priuses running around out there. But the landscape is changing and Honda and Toyota may have to play catch-up.

Ferrari’s new hybrid supercar “is part of a wave of green supercars as high-end automakers step up efforts to make their models environmentally palatable while maintaining or boosting performance,” according to Bloomberg Businessweek. “As more models become available and emission rules tighten, sales of hybrid supercars may surge from fewer than 100 this year (2013) to more than 2,100 in 2015, according to IHS Automotive.”

Already, other makers of prestige cars are gearing up, so to speak. Porsche is developing the 918 Spyder (a fancy word for convertible), which will have a hybrid power train boasting some 795 horsepower and a base U.S. price of $845,000. Mercedes-Benz has a hybrid variant of its gullwing sports car in the works – they call it the SLS AMG e-Cell and it should have more than 700 horsepower; price, so far, has not been disclosed. And BMW is working on its VisionEfficientDynamics supercar, with – only! – 350 horsepower and a price that will be less than a Rolls-Royce.

Why the name LaFerrari?

For now, we get to bask in the glory of LaFerrari, and that brings up the question of naming. LaFerrari means, in English, The Ferrari. Okay. We know that. It looks like a Ferrari. It has the prancing horse badging. It’s red. In the past, Ferrari was fairly humdrum in its nomenclature – Enzo (for the first name of the patron, Enzo Ferrari); lots of alphanumeric chat – the fabled V12 engines usually had a number that equaled the cubic centimeter displacement of one cylinder. Hence, the 365 Daytona (that’s a well known race track in Florida) had a 4390cc V12 engine. Many Ferraris were called GT, for Gran Turismo. Some referred to mechanical wizardry (Testarossa, for red head, meaning the camshaft covers were painted red). But LaFerrari? Come on.

Of course, Ferrari’s occasional glitch in the car-naming biz (if not in the car-making biz) is nothing compared to some bloopers in the past. Take General Motors. The Chevy Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries, possibly because “no va” means “no go.” Even in English, nova can be taken to mean an exploding star, something you’d rather not associate with your daily driver. Some others that come to mind: Datsun Fairlady, Subaru Brat, Ford Aspire (aspire to an anemic slowbox of a sedan?).